Reporters Emily Opilo and Kayla Dwyer recount the testimony of Sam Ruchlewicz, former top aide to Allentown Mayor Ed Pawlowski, during the federal trial on Monday, Feb. 5, 2018. Also: the first tapes involving co-defendent Scott Allinson are played in court.

Reporters Emily Opilo and Kayla Dwyer recount the testimony of Sam Ruchlewicz, former top aide to Allentown Mayor Ed Pawlowski, during the federal trial on Monday, Feb. 5, 2018. Also: the first tapes involving co-defendent Scott Allinson are played in court.

Peter Hall and Emily OpiloOf The Morning Call

As Allentown Mayor Ed Pawlowski’s U.S. Senate campaign gained momentum in 2015, he turned to a political fundraiser who operated in the upper echelon of the Democratic Party for help collecting money.

Pawlowski figured he needed $1 million by the first primary reporting deadline to be a contender, and believed that by ingratiating himself with Jack Rosen, a wealthy developer with ties to the Clintons, he could reach that goal, his top adviser has testified in federal court.

Pawlowski had his staff in City Hall line up an opportunity for Rosen’s cybersecurity firm to do business with Allentown, witnesses in Pawlowski’s corruption trial have testified.

PHOTO GALLERY: Scenes from the corruption trial of Allentown Mayor Ed Pawlowski at the federal courthouse in Allentown.

Now all he had to do was make the ask.

“How much do you gotta raise?” Rosen asked Pawlowski in a secret recording of a May 8, 2015, meeting in Rosen’s New York City office that prosecutors played Monday in court.

“I wanted to raise a million by June 30, but I got 400,000 already,” Pawlowski told Rosen. “I think I can do it. My hope was you would help raise 100,000 in New York.”

After discussing federal campaign contribution limits and how many donors would be needed, Rosen told Pawlowski, “I ah, I think we will raise you some money.”

The recording tied together the testimony of former Allentown Managing Director Francis Dougherty and campaign adviser Sam Ruchlewicz, who told jurors Monday about another scheme in which Pawlowski’s co-defendant, Scott Allinson, allegedly made and solicited campaign contributions for Pawlowski to get work for Allinson’s firm.

Ruchlewicz and Dougherty told jurors earlier in the trial they were tasked with finding work for Rosen’s company 5C, later called Ciiber, and that Pawlowski hoped the deal would give his campaign access to New York political fundraising circles.

The computer security company, staffed by former agents of the Israeli national security agency Mossad, was more than the city needed, and the heads of the city’s public safety agencies were reluctant to turn over information to the firm, Dougherty testified.

In another meeting, Pawlowski and Ruchlewicz led Rosen to believe a no-bid contract for Ciiber was a done deal in March 2015, according to a recording by Ruchlewicz and also played for jurors Monday.

“They had all their questions answered they were just waiting on something from you guys, and as soon as that was done the contract would be signed,” Ruchlewicz said of the Allentown officials working on the project.

“I thought I signed it last week,” Pawlowski added. In reality, the contract was still pending when the FBI raided City Hall four months later.

Driving to the May 2015 Rosen meeting, Pawlowski and Fleck discussed what the ask would be, according to a video secretly recorded by Fleck also played Monday.

Pawlowski’s campaign consultant, Lisa Rossi, had advised him to ask Rosen for $50,000, Fleck reminded him. Pawlowski said he wanted to ask for $100,000, and both discussed the possibility Rosen could gather $1 million by the end of 2015 and pondered what he would want in exchange.

Pawlowski, 52, is charged with 54 counts alleging he traded public contracts and favors in City Hall for contributions to his campaign funds as he ran for governor and U.S. Senate. He and Allinson, who faces charges of conspiracy and bribery, have pleaded not guilty.

Ruchlewicz, who cooperated with investigators for more than a year, spent his second day on the witness stand Monday. He has not been charged with a crime.

His testimony Monday also focused on Pawlowski’s relationship with Allinson, a city attorney with the firm Norris McLaughlin & Marcus. Prosecutors played a series of tapes in which Allinson discussed his concerns that his firm had not received work from the city. The attorney told Pawlowski’s campaign advisers that made it difficult for him to solicit donations from his partners.

“I’m not in a position like I used to be, ‘Hey we need $2,500 for this, we need $2,500 for that,’” Allinson told Ruchlewicz in one of the recorded conversations played in court.

“The well is completely dry right now so I’m just talking our dialect of English. We’ve been incredibly supportive, but the work’s been going everywhere else but our shop,” Allinson said, adding, “This is a short-term fixable issue.”

Asked what Allinson meant, Ruchlewicz testified, “We used ‘dialect of English’ to refer to pay-to-play activities.”

“The ‘short-term fixable issue’ was the lack of work going to Norris McLaughlin. It was fixable by securing additional contracts for Norris McLaughlin,” Ruchlewicz said.

According to several conversations played for the jury, attorneys at Allinson’s firm were concerned the city’s new solicitor, then Susan Wild, was going to cut off work to the firm. Wild had a reputation as being “caustic,” and was unfriendly to the firm, Allinson complained to Pawlowski’s campaign team.

Allinson also relayed a grievance from firm attorney Oldrich Foucek III. Foucek was initially assigned to represent the city in a legal matter later given to another firm at the mayor’s direction, Allinson said.

Pawlowski and his campaign staff discussed ways to soothe the firm, such as offering a solicitor position for the Allentown Parking Authority to Allinson or to firm attorney Richard Somach. But secret recordings also showed that Allinson’s reluctance to donate agitated the mayor.

“Relatively, compared to other law firms, they’ve given nothing,” Pawlowski said to Ruchlewicz during a car ride in January 2015. “Allinson for sure will get nothing now.”

Later, Pawlowski could be heard on recordings asking his staff whether they are going to “light up” Allinson. They assured him they would.

“What does that mean?” prosecutor Anthony Wzorek asked Ruchlewicz on the witness stand after Ruchlewicz said the incident was an example of a time when the mayor used him and Fleck as insulation.

“To have a very frank and open conversation with him that this was unacceptable behavior,” Ruchlewicz responded, adding that they would yell at Allinson if necessary.

Allinson repeatedly told Pawlowski’s campaign staff on secret recordings that all legal work for the city needed to be funneled through him. “I get 100 percent of the kind of credit that turns into money that goes out of my checkbook to where you want it to go,” Allinson said in one recording.

Ruchlewicz testified that it was part of a system to kick back some of the firm’s money to the mayor in the form of campaign donations.

As Pawlowski’s U.S. Senate campaign got underway, he and his campaign team asked the firm’s attorneys to raise $25,000. As the conversation began, the group discussed Whitehall Mayor Ed Hozza’s recent re-election victory.

“The good news for you is that he sues us every five seconds,” Pawlowski said, alluding to the legal work he claimed Hozza could generate. Pawlowski and Hozza have had an ongoing dispute.

As the group left the office, Pawlowski noted to his staff that the attorneys appeared to be responsive to the Whitehall issue because they were going to get more legal work from the city.

Sam Ruchlewicz, an adviser to Mayor Ed Pawlowski's campaigns for governor and Senate, testified about Pawlowski asking Democratic fundraiser Jack Rosen to collect $100,000 for his campaign fund. He also testified about Pawlowski's co-defendant Scott Allinson's complaint when asked for contributions that his firm didn't receive city business.

Who testified?

Sam Ruchlewicz, campaign adviser

Who's testifying today?

Ruchlewicz will continue testifying and will face cross-examination by attorneys for Pawlowski and Allinson.